Sylvia

“The truth turns into a story when it grows old. We all become stories in the end. So, though the narrative was flawed, the sense was of a life so lived it was epic.”
― Niall Williams, This Is Happiness

“At the time you’re living it you can sometimes think your life is nothing much. It’s ordinary and everyday and should be and could be in this or that way better. It is without the perspective by which any meaning can be derived because it’s too sensual and urgent and immediate, which is the way life is to be lived. We’re all, all the time, striving, and though that means there’s a more-or-less constant supply of failure, it’s not such a terrible thing if you think that we keep on trying. There’s something to consider for that.”
― Niall Williams, This Is Happiness

“After a liquid lunch in Craven’s, he had found the margins of the roads badly drawn.”
― Niall Williams, This Is Happiness

“I sometimes think the worst thing a young person can feel is when you can find no answer to the question of what you are supposed to do with this life you’ve been given. At moments you’re aware of it balanced on your tongue, but not what comes next. Something like that. I can now say that another version of that happens in old age, when it occurs to you that since you’ve lived this long you must have learned something, so you open your eyes before dawn and think: What is it that I’ve learned, what is it I want to say?”
― Niall Williams, This Is Happiness